Just when the magic of Christmas starts to fade as we get older, a new generation comes along to bring it back. All the wonder and joy of the season is reflected in fresh eyes. Memories flood from the time when our own eyes were clear and bright. Only now, we are Santa Claus. We are the ones who get to carry a sack of Christmas magic on our backs. We listen and watch and ask, “what do you want Santa to bring you?”

Magically, things that were relegated to the past become present again: school holiday concerts, making snowmen and snow angels, and sledding down a hill covered with snow so fresh that it is still falling. You can hear the excitement of the season whooshing downhill with you.

Home is now your own invention. You have traditions to fall back on but you also invent some new ones to match the times you live in, the new holiday music and movies you absorb, and the new creatures – human and otherwise – who share your home.

One of the oldest traditions to fall back on is the Tannenbaum. People have been putting trees in the middle of their living rooms for 500 years and there is still a strange mix of the absurd and the familiar whenever the tree goes up and the outside comes in. I never met a child or a cat who didn’t love a Christmas tree.

In fact, the only time a cat doesn’t like a Christmas tree is when they are being herded in front of it for a holiday photo.